Russia Presses 2 Baltic Lands on Minorities

Published: March 7, 1994

MOSCOW, March 6—
Russia's Foreign Ministry stepped up pressure on Latvia and Estonia today, saying it considered the protection of ethnic Russians in the Baltic states a priority, Itar-Tass news agency said.

Moscow has been engaged in an increasingly rancorous war of words with the Baltic republics about supposed discrimination against their large Russian-speaking minorities since the former Soviet Union collapsed in 1991.

Deputy Foreign Minister Vitaly Churkin told a meeting of the Public Chamber, a body that makes recommendations to President Boris Yeltsin, that "the infringement of the rights of Russians"in Latvia and Estonia "is giving cause for great concern."

Russia contends that language, citizenship and voting laws passed by Latvia and Estonia have turned Russian-speakers into second-class citizens.

Moscow has had fewer disagreements with Lithuania, whose Russian population is smaller.

"You can understand the anxiety of Latvians who think that having 40 percent Russians in their republic is a lot," Mr. Churkin told Tass. "But the problem needs to be and can be solved in the framework of cooperation," and"not at the price of forcing out Russian speakers from territory where they have been living for many years, and where many of them have been born."